China now fears 80,000-plus toll

Posted: Sunday, May 25, 2008

YINGXIU, China - China warned Saturday that the death toll from a massive earthquake two weeks ago could take a major leap and pass 80,000, suggesting the government may be giving up hope of finding more survivors.

But rescuers rushed anyway to reach 24 coal miners who officials said were trapped in three mines by the disaster, though it was not known if the miners were alive.

"We have had the miracle in the past that a miner was found alive after being trapped underground for 21 days," Wang Dexue, the deputy chief of the government's work safety department, told a news conference in Beijing. "We are carrying out rescue work on the assumption that they are still alive. We absolutely will not give up."

Wang gave no further details of the trapped miners. China's mines are the world's deadliest, with explosions, cave-ins and floods killing nearly 3,800 people last year.

Meanwhile, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon made a brief visit Saturday to one of the hardest-hit towns, Yingxiu - a helicopter ride that offered a rare bird's-eye views of the destruction wrought by the 7.9-magnitude quake on May 12.

The mountains in central Sichuan province showed huge tracks of naked earth from landslides. Layers of mud covered fields. Rivers churned brown. Yingxiu itself was largely piles of rubble, and the buildings left standing had caved in, giving the surreal impression that they had melted.

The State Council, China's Cabinet, said Saturday the latest confirmed death toll for the quake - China's biggest disaster in three decades - was 60,560, with 26,221 people still missing.

Premier Wen Jiabao, on a return visit to the quake zone to accompany Ban, warned the toll could go much higher.

"It may further climb to a level of 70,000, 80,000 or more," Wen said, standing amid the rubble in Yingxiu. The jump could occur as the number of missing are added to the number of dead.

About 15 minutes before Wen started talking, yet another minor aftershock rumbled.

Ban, who came to China directly from cyclone-stricken Myanmar, promised the U.N. would help with reconstruction and that it was waiting for China's assessment of what was needed.

"If we work hard, we can overcome this," Ban said, with Wen standing at his side. "The whole world stands behind you and supports you."

The secretary-general left China later Saturday and was to attend an aid donors conference in Myanmar for cyclone victims today.